Thursday, February 7, 2013

Valentine's Activities


Postman Songs

It is Valentine's Day next week, so my little ones have been doing a lot of Valentine's Activities.

We usually start Valetine's week with the song "The postman brings a valentine". It goes like this:

"The Postman brings a valentine, a valentine, a valentine

The postman brings a valentine, it's for you!"

The activity for this song is very simple. The kids sit in a circle, and one "postman" walks around while the song is sung. On the word "you" the postman drops a valetine in the lap of the closest person. Then it is a game of chase (a la duck duck grey duck) around the circle.

This song is a great transition into the students' favorite game of all time, "Postman, Postman":

"Postman, Postman

Do you have a letter?

Postman, Postman

Two would suite me better

I can hardly wait to see

What is in the mail for me"

I've played this game two ways. The first (and most time consuming) consists of me creating "mail" for all of my students. I've made concert tickets, trips to hawaii, junk mail, bills, etc. When the students are sitting in a circle, I go around from person to person and sing, "do you have a letter?". The student then has to reply, "Yes, I have a letter" in order to get a piece of mail. Another way of doing it for older students is to sing do you have a letter, and have the student improvise the rhythm "do you have a letter" on the orff instruments. They have to either sing it correctly, or play it in rhythm to get their letter. Then once everyone has a letter, they all open them up and see what treasures they got.

Another cute way to play this game is to have the students make the "mail". I have them write an anonomous letter (or picture) and put it in an envelope. Then we play the same way, but the students then get a letter from a classmate instead of me. Either way, they love it!

I wish I had a little Red Box

On Smart Exchange there is an adorable Valetine's Activity that goes to the tune of polly wally doodle. It goes like this:

"I wish I had a little red box to put my _____ in. 
I'd take her/him out and go hug hug hug 
and put her/him back again"  

The smart file comes with a bunch of hearts, and a red box. I make the hearts pure white until they are clicked, which then reveal a student's name. One by one the students go up and choose a random heart. Whatever name is on that heart is their "valentine". They then have to drag (if you have smartboard - which I don't, so I drag it for them with my mouse) to the red box, while the students sing the song with that name put in. It's cute, and the kids like it. K-1 is the best age however, any older and they get so embarassed about the "valentines" that they act really silly (and not in a good way).

I also did a version of this song using laminated hears (that I wrote names on with wet erase markers), and a physical red box that they drew names out of.

Valentine's Singing Books

Some books that I have used in my classroom for valentines day are "Froggie Went a Courtin" by Iza Trapani and "Risseldy-Rossedly" in the John Fierabend collection. I sing a majority of the book to them, but they sing the "hmm-hmms" for the froggie story, and the "Risseldy-Rosseldy mow, mow, mow" for the latter. I LOVE to use pictures books that the kids can sing, and these are both very valentines-esque.



Valentine's Karaoke
On Valetine's day my older students get to sing"Valetine's Karaoke" (they also have a Christmas one in December). For this I create a presentation that has many love songs that they can sing karaoke to. Some include, "Can you feel the love tonight", "Can't Help Falling in Love", "Can't Help Falling in Love", etc! It's a fun activity that gets them singing, especially when they are hyped up on sugar and regular instruction is difficult!




2 comments:

  1. Virtual Valentine's celebration offers fun and creative ways for HR, managers, employees and coworkers to engage in fun team building activities and bond. You can check out the 8 unique Valentine's virtual activities for work in 2022.

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  2. Virtual activities for valentine's day offer the perfect chance to show your staff how much you appreciate them and use this holiday as an opportunity to increase employee engagement, boost employee morale, and share some positivity.

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